Baking Cakes in Kigali - Gaile Parkin

Baking Cakes in Kigali has been on my to-read list for a while, and as I have a friend who recently traveled to Rwanda and was in Kigali for New Years', the book popped back to the front of my mind and it seemed like a good time to read it!

Set in Kigali in 2000, the story is a slow, character-driven one about a neighborhood that centers around a single apartment complex and particularly one woman who lives there, Angel.  Angel is a native Tanzanian who lives in Kigali with her husband, who is doing consulting work for a technical institute, and their five grandchildren, who they care for in the wake of the deaths of both of their children.  Angel interacts with other people who live in the complex as well as others they are connected to, and others still who come to order cakes from her.  Her cake making business is the heart of the book, bringing her into the lives of many other people and revealing their secrets to her, as she promises confidentiality as part of being a "professional somebody."  There characters include Odile, a nurse who survived the Rwandan genocide; Jenna, the wife of a CIA agent who she doesn't know is a CIA agent, and who is also cheating on her; Sophie and Catherine, a pair of American volunteers helping with the reconstruction of Rwanda in the wake of the genocide; Vincenzo, Amina, and Safiya, a Muslim family Angel is close to; and Leocadie, a young woman who runs a small shop down the street.

This is a book that touches on a multitude of tough subjects while still remaining a wholesome story.  There are so many tough subjects--AIDS, genocide, suicide, rape, genital mutilation, kidnap and child soldiers, to name just a few--that I kept expecting disaster to pop up around every corner, but it (thankfully) never did.  Really, the story touches on those things, but it's about Angel acting as a sort of mother to the entire neighborhood, handing out wisdom over cake and milky cardamom tea.  Love, loss, and schemes are all poured out and over, and Angel, despite having had difficult times of her own, remains a calm force throughout, and even leverages her insight for others to help herself come to terms with the death of her daughter.

I liked the writing here.  At some times I did find it a bit stiff and formal--however, I had to keep in mind that, while this book was written in English, most of the dialogue is actually delivered in Swahili that Parkin represents as English on the page.  Some other reviews indicate that Angel's version of Kigali seems a bit too bright and sunny for taking place after the genocide--however, the genocide occurred in 1994, and the book takes place in 2000.  There are ongoing trials and attempts at reconciliation--two of the characters that Angel meets have come from South Africa, where they worked on the truth and reconciliation process following the breakdown of apartheid, in order to assist--but six years can change a heck of a lot.  And I think Parkin did a good job showing that, while some people seem happy and functional, they can still be deeply scarred and haunted below the surface.  And it's also important to remember that, while the genocide was clearly a huge part of recent Rwandan history, it's not all that Rwanda is--and that, I think, is what Parkin was really aiming for, and I think she accomplished it.

The structure of the book revolves a series of events, all things which people would order a cake for, which allows Angel to really become involved.  Again, this is a character driven book, which means that there's not a strong central plot and the story instead revolves slowly around the people on the page rather than a driving event or crisis.  The structure works well for this type of narrative, but it's definitely not something that everyone enjoys.  Considering this was a first novel, I think it was done extremely well; characters can be hard to balance without plot points driving them along, but Parkin did so with aplomb, and this was overall a joy to read.

4 stars out of 5.